Not Today Thank You

Stoke Museum and Art Gallery, October 2024 (all photos taken by Lola II)

Long ago Lola II and I used to go away together for a weekend, sometimes with Sister D, usually around Lola II's birthday in February. The weather was often poor and many attractions were closed, which we ascribed to the time of year and inevitably blamed our parents. This time, for a few days at the end of October, we went to Stoke-on-Trent. Here is a brief overview of the visit: the weather was poor and many attractions were closed. So it isn't just February, and maybe our parents weren't to blame, but my goodness, Stoke on Trent failed to deliver the short break we were hoping for.

We arrived on Tuesday having done fairly minimal preparation, although the B&B was pre-booked. It was a pub with rooms, and only when we arrived did we realise that it was some way from the station in the opposite direction to the main town area. As those of you familiar with Arnold Bennett's books (my source material for much of my prior knowledge of Stoke) will know, there are a cluster of five towns in the region: Tunstall, Burslem, Hanley, Fenton, Stoke and Longton. So there are actually six, which makes as much sense as anything else in Stoke. [Historical note: they were amalgamated in 1910 to become the county borough of Stoke-on-Trent.]

When we got to the pub at the end of Tuesday, it turned out to have not only the rooms upstairs but also a well-equipped kitchen where we were encouraged to help ourselves to breakfast - not only cereal and toast and yogurt and juice but also eggs that we could cook for ourselves. There was nobody else staying when we arrived, and we were told that the manager had left unexpectedly so existing bookings were being honoured but no new ones taken until a replacement was recruited. The pub downstairs smelled a bit dank, closed at 9pm on weekdays, and everyone turned to look at us when we walked through to the stairs the first time; after that we used the back entrance. But the room and kitchen upstairs were lovely.

I would assert that our accommodation was the best part of the trip. Lola II and I had both made cursory searches to find interesting museums, eating places, entertainment and other potential attractions in the city. There was a film and a play we wanted to see so that would take up two evenings, and various pottery museums and restaurants that looked interesting, but our first foray into town to find lunch was problematic. We found that hardly anything was open on Tuesday, except a sandwich restaurant where we wanted to eat, but it was fully booked. 

This was a running theme throughout our stay. The tourist information office appeared to be located in the Museum and Art Gallery, which was closed on Tuesdays. The place that looked promising for desserts had run out of fudge cake. The next day the sandwich place was fully booked again and the dumpling restaurant that was supposed to be open was still closed. The café at the theatre on Wednesday night was fully booked, so our (perfectly acceptable) supper was crisps, cake and beer. By Thursday we'd cottoned on so we phoned the dumpling restaurant to check its opening hours and booked the sandwich restaurant for Friday.

The Old Free Library with Shakespeare mosaic and faded tiles (unocccupied)

The Museum and Art Gallery was open on Wednesday, but they told us that the Tourist Information Office hadn't been located there for some time, and in fact there seemed to be no source of tourist information other than leaflets and websites. Lola II and I have been to lots of places now, and each one has had some sort of guided tour of places of interest. Stoke isn't short of places of interest and it's a shame that there were no local guides. We did follow an interesting online trail highlighting various beautiful buildings with terracotta decoration and tiled details, nearly all of which were closed down and boarded up and decaying. It would have been better if a tour could have been delivered in person, and maybe would have provided a boost to the local economy.

One successful eating place was the Oatcake shop (closed on Tuesdays and doesn't take card payments on Thursdays). We managed to get there while it was open, brought cash, and tried a filled oatcake each - they are very much like pancakes or crepes. There was a very authentic and delicious Vietnamese restaurant which we almost left because the menu didn't have anything that was vegetarian, although they produced tofu when we asked. The dumpling restaurant was underwhelming despite a positive write-up in the Guardian, but in the sandwich shop my tofu and kimchi toasted sandwich was outstanding, and better than Lola II's halloumi and tomato relish. We also made our own supper one evening in the little kitchen at the pub.

Enough of the food, on to the other attractions. The main Museum and Art Gallery is the home of the Staffordshire Hoard, a wonderful treasure that I saw when it was displayed in Birmingham a few years ago. Which was lucky, because here in Stoke it had been completely removed leaving the cases in the gallery empty. There was a fairly interesting art exhibition that Lola II got us into for free with her Art Pass, and we spent the rest of our time in the museum looking at exhibitions of local history, fossils and stuffed animals, and an enormous amount of pottery. It's what the area is famous for, after all.

With hope in our hearts and having checked the opening hours we headed for the Spode Museum next day. Trying to find the entrance we encountered another visitor who was similarly confused. She was from Germany and was having a canal boat holiday, and had specifically come into town for this museum. When we eventually found it, despite the sign on the door suggesting that it ought to be open, the doors were locked. Luckily someone inside heard us knocking, and explained when she opened the door that she was on her own as the other volunteers had not turned up, and had we come far? We certainly had, and as we appeared to be relatively harmless she was kind enough to allow us inside (but locked the door behind us). 

She gave us a really interesting introduction to the museum and told us that only 47 of the bottle kilns are left in the area out of the thousands that were there in Stoke's heyday. (This is why Stoke should have real people giving tours, it was much better than reading a leaflet or a web page or just having labels in display cases.) There was an old film showing the stages of making, firing and decorating pottery which was really interesting too. When we left there were a group of people waiting outside the locked door but they weren't let in, so we were particularly lucky on that occasion.

Later in the day we thought we'd stop by and have a look at Stoke Minster, where Josiah Wedgewood and Josiah Spode are both buried. They're outside in the churchyard, which is lucky because the Minster itself was closed. And the tea room nearby that looked very attractive was fully booked and didn't even have space for us to wait.

We took a bus to the small theatre for a John Godber play (Perfect Pitch) and enjoyed it, but the Iranian film we saw the following night (My Favourite Cake) was even better. Getting around by bus was a bit of a challenge - it was quite difficult to locate the right bus stop to wait at, and then the drivers seemed to have trouble understanding what we were saying. 

On Thursday night we tried to plan for our last day, and work out what to do until our trains left in the early afternoon. There didn't seem to be anything. Another pottery museum looked promising, but our experience suggested it would be worth phoning to check its opening hours, and sure enough it was closed. So in the end we watched Tales of the Unexpected and Frasier on the TV in the room until it was time to vacate, and then just went into town for lunch. While we were eating, Lola II received a notification that her train was cancelled, so she asked at the station whether she could get an earlier train, and when the answer was no we tried to go into the station hotel opposite for a cup of tea. It was closed.

After we'd returned from the trip, Mr M sent me an extract of an article about a remake of the film "Dr Strangelove". It says:

"Take the stark scene where Pentagon top brass haggle over a city to offer up to the Russians as a sacrificial lamb. When it's suggested Stoke might be blasted to smithereens, a loud cheer rises from the audience."